Russian Civil War

The Russian Civil War

Following the success of the revolution the Communists decided to make a
peace with Germany at the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, ratified on March 6,
1918. Despite re-organising the old army into the "Workers' and Peasants'
Red Army" in January 1918, when the Germans began an advance into Russia in
February the chaotic and undisciplined state of the army was such that a
negotiated peace was the only option.

This treaty galvanised a number of anti-Communist groups both inside and
outside Russia into action against the new regime, Winston Churchill
declaring that Bolshevism must be "strangled in its cradle".

Overview

The war was fought mainly between the "Reds", the communists and
revolutionaries, and the "Whites" - the monarchists, reactionaries,
democrats and conservatives who opposed the Russian Revolution. There were
also foreign elements involved supporting the Whites in their fight against
Bolshevism. There was also a collection of proscribed moderate socialists
who fought against both sides, or on occasion with the "Reds" against the
"Whites". This group was known as the "Greens".

The military war was fought across three main fronts - the eastern, the
southern and the northwestern. It can also be roughly split into three periods.

The first period lasted from the Revolution until the Armistice. The
conflict began with dissenting Russian groups, the main force was the newly
formed Volunteer Army in the Don region which was joined later by the
Czecho-Slovak Legion in Siberia. In the east there were also two
anti-Bolshevich administrations, Komuch in Samara and the nationalist
Siberian government centred in Omsk. Most of the fighting in this first
period was sporadic, involving only small groups amid a fluid and rapidly
shifting strategic scene. The main antagonists were the Czecho-Slovaks and
the pro-Bolshevik Latvians.

The second period of the war was the key stage, it lasted only from March to
November 1919. At first the White armies advancing from the south (Denikin),
the northwest (Iudenich) and the east (Kolchak) were successful, forcing the
new Red Army back and advancing on Moscow. However under Trotsky the Red
Army was reformed and pushed back Kolchak's forces from June and the armies
of Denikin and Iudenich from October. The fighting power of Kolchak and
Denikin was broken almost simultaneously in mid-November.

The final period of the conflict was the extended defeat of the White forces
in the Crimea. Wrangel had gathered the remnants of the armies of Denikin
and they had fortified their positions in the Crimea. With the Red Army
fighting in Poland from April 1920 the Whites held their positions until
that struggle was over. When the full force of the Red Army was turned on
them they were soon overwhelmed, the remaining troops being evacuated to
Constantinople in November 1920.

The Beginnings

Britain, France and USA all intervened in the civil war. After the Allies
defeated Germany in November 1918, they continued their intervention in the
war against the communists, in the interests of averting what they feared
might become a world socialist revolution. Lenin was surprised by the
outbreak of the Civil War and initially under-estimated the extent of the
forces that rose against his new country, early successes in the Don region
made him over-confident.

The initial group that stood against the Communists from the start were
mainly counter-revolutionary generals and local Cossack armies that had
declared their loyalty to the Provisional Government—prominent were
Kaledin (Don Cossacks), Dutov (Orenburg Cossacks), and Semenov (Baikal
Cossacks). In November General Alekseev, the old tsarist Commander-in-Chief,
began to organise a Volunteer Army in Novocherkassk, he was joined in
December by Kornilov, Denikin and a number of others, aided by Kaledin they
took Rostov in December. However the Cossacks were unwilling to fight, and
when the Soviet counter-offensive began in January under Antonov-Ovseenko
the Cossacks quickly deserted Kaledin, who committed suicide. Antonov's
forces quickly recovered Rostov and by the end of March 1918 the Don Soviet
Republic was declared. The Volunteer Army was evacuated in February and
escaped to the Kuban where they joined with the Kuban Cossacks to mount an
abortive assault on Ekaterinodar, Kornilov was killed on April 13 and
command passed to Denikin who retreated back to the Don. The Soviets had
succeeded in alienating the local population and the Volunteer Army had many
new recruits.

It was not until the spring of 1918 that the Mensheviks and SRs joined the
armed struggle, initially they had been opposed to the armed overthrow of
the Bolsheviks but the peace treaty and the establishment of some harsh
dictatorial measures changed their outlook. Potentially they could have been
a serious threat as they had a degree of popular support and the authority
of their election victory on the Constituent Assembly in 1918. The new
problem for them was the need for armed support. An early attempt by the SRs
to recruit Latvian troops in July 1918 was an disaster. Fortunately the
Czecho-Slovak legion proved to be a more reliable group to aid the
"democratic counter-revolution".

The Czecho-Slovak legion had been part of the tsarist army and by October
1917 numbered around 30,000 men, mostly ex-prisoners and deserters from the
Austro-Hungarian army, encouraged by Tomas Masaryk the legion was renamed
the Czecho-Slovak Army Corps and hoped to continue fighting the Germans. An
agreement with the Soviet government to pass by sea through Vladivostok
collapsed over an attempt to, largely, disarm the Corps and in June 1918 the
force rebelled while they were in Cheliabinsk. Within a month the
Czecho-Slovaks controlled much of western Siberia, and parts of the Volga
and Urals regions. By August they had extended their control even further,
cutting off Siberia (and its precious grain supplies) from the rest of
Russia.

The Mensheviks and SRs supported peasant action against the Soviet control
of food supplies. In May 1918 with the support of the Czecho-Slovaks they
took Samara and Saratov, establishing the Committee of Members of the
Constituent Assembly (Komuch). By July the authority of Komuch extended over
much of the area controlled by the Czecho-Slovaks. They intended to resume
anti-German operations and began to form their own People's Army, they also
implemented a socialist reform programme but without the unpopular economic
changes the Soviets were pursuing. However Komuch was a dictatorship and
they could be as ruthless as the Soviets they deplored.

There were also conservative and nationalist "governments" being formed by
the Bashkirs, the Kirghiz and the Turkic-Tatar as well as a Siberian
Regional Government in Omsk. In September 1918 all the non-Soviet
governments met in Ufa and agreed to form a new Russian Provisional
Government in Omsk, headed by a Directory of five, three SRs (Avksentiev,
Boldyrev and Zenzinov) and two Kadets (Vinogradov and Volgogodskii). The new
government quickly came under the influence of the Siberian Regional
Government and their new War Minister, Rear-Admiral Kolchak. On November 18
a coup d'etat established Kolchak as dictator. The members of the Directory
were arrested and Kolchak promoted himself to admiral and proclaimed himself
"Supreme Ruler". To the Soviets this change of control was a military
problem but a political victory—confirming its opponents as
reactionaries. Kolchak, as the Soviets feared, initially proved himself an
able commander. Following a reorganisation of the People's Army his forces
captured Perm and extended their control into Soviet territory.

In Soviet territory following the Fifth Congress of Soviets in July two Left
SRs assassinated the German ambassador in Moscow, Count Mirbach in an
attempt to provoke the Germans into renewing hostilities. Other Left SRs
captured a number of prominent Bolsheviks and attempted to rouse Red Army
troops against the regime. The Soviets managed to put down local risings
organised by the SRs (and Anarchists) and Lenin personally apologised to the
Germans for the assassination, although German reprisals were unlikely due
to the state of the Western Front. There were mass arrests of Left SRs and
following two further terrorist acts on August 30, the assassination of the
Chairman of the Petrograd Cheka and the wounding of Lenin in another
attempt, the Red Terror was unleashed—the Mensheviks and SRs were
expelled from the Soviets and anyone suspected of counter-revolutionary
activity could be imprisoned or executed without trial.

Following their poor display against the Germans the Red Army had been
re-reorganised under the new Supreme Military Council, headed by Leon
Trotsky—the many different units were homogenized and former army
officers were brought back into the army as "military specialists". In May
1918 with the number of soldiers static at 450,000 compulsory conscription
was reintroduced. Followed by a purge of army commanders in July, with the
purpose of not introducing Communists but of bringing back capable military
officers. In September a resolution was passed directing the whole of Soviet
Russia towards military measures, Trotsky was appointed head of a new
Revolutionary Military council of the Republic, with wide-ranging powers.